Design Archives

Water: H2O = Life

Description

This show examines water’s importance to humans, animals and the environment, problems of having too little and too much, how we are changing it, and how we can help solve some of the problems we have created. The graphic-design challenge was to unify a diverse series of exhibits, from a full-size polar bear to an entire wall of bottled water.

The show was an opportunity to explore translucency and depth; the graphics print directly to Plexiglas in several layers of transparency. Large-scale imagery is printed on the back of the Plexi, and type and photos are printed over translucent veils of color on the front surface. On intro panels, titles knock out to the image behind and the accompanying shadows evoke depth. Working within a tight budget, designers generated many background images, shooting dry ice and waves in aquariums, using vacation shots of the sea and snapshots of the pond in Central Park. The photography evokes the enveloping quality of water and the motion inherent in the medium.

Graphic panels are organized in horizontal bands around the (generally circular) spaces; while the spaces themselves reference individual drops, the bands recall the horizon and the leveling quality of water.